What is Melatonin?
Melatonin is a natural hormone in our body, and it is responsible for making us feel sleepy at night. The pineal gland produces the hormone, which is triggered when our eyes sense light or lack of light.
How does melatonin work?
When night time comes, our eyes sense a lack of light, and our body naturally triggers the pineal gland to produce melatonin. With high levels of melatonin in our bodies, we feel sleepy and naturally fall into slumber. Then, when daylight comes, our eyes sense bright light. Daylight triggers the pineal gland to stop producing melatonin until the hormone’s levels on our bodies fall, and we become awake.
The problem is that our modern world exposes us to light all the time. Exposure to blue light in technology and gadgets like house and street lights, smartphones, smart TVs, and more can trick our pineal gland into thinking that it’s still daytime.
And with constant exposure to light when it’s already nighttime, our system gets confused. So when your melatonin goes into hormonal imbalance, the situation can lead to sleep disorders. The problem with lack of sleep is that its results go beyond simply being tired all day. Of course, without a good night’s rest, your body was unable to restore its lost cells, properly repair its tissues, and do all of its natural therapeutic functions to its maximum potential.
So when you go on without proper sleep, you become susceptible to exacerbated stress, fatigue, and a weak body. When sleeplessness continues for a long time, your immune system may become compromised, and other health problems can come your way.
Here are some of the effects of lack of sleep.
Anxiety, Stress and Depression
When you lack sleep, the hormones responsible for your moods like oxytocin, dopamine, serotonin, and others become unable to replenish appropriately. And this situation leads to an imbalance. So you can have too many levels or too little at the wrong times. With hormonal imbalance comes an inability to manage your thoughts and feelings, which can exacerbate stress, anxiety and depression.
Obesity
Lack of sleep does not only affect the hormones that affect your mood. Constant sleeplessness can also affect hormones that regulate your appetite. When your sleep cycle or circadian rhythm becomes off, so does your appetite. Your body gets tricked into thinking that it’s time to eat when it isn’t.
This is why when you lack sleep, you can suddenly feel an unnecessary hunger. And this is where obesity comes from. You satisfy your unnecessary hunger with extra calories late at night and end up gaining a lot of weight over time. And of course, for most people, when you gain unwanted weight, that can add to your body insecurity, which can exacerbate any anxiety or depression you have.
Diabetes
Of course, obesity can also lead to higher chances of having diabetes. But lack of sleep contributes to having the disease in more ways than one. Insulin is also a hormone, and when you lack sleep, it becomes imbalanced, potentially leading to diabetes.
Heart Disease and Other Chronic Illnesses
Sleep is the time for your body to fortify your immune system and repair damages. So when you lack sleep, you become more vulnerable not only to diseases from germs, viruses and bacteria but also to major illnesses that can become severe over time. In short, you can quickly get sick when you don’t have regular sleep. So you can be more susceptible to flu and other minor illnesses.
In the case of heart disease, sleepless nights can give you a combo of effects that lead to it. Stress, obesity, and a weak body can result from lacking sleep and contribute to developing problems in your circulatory system. On the other hand, lack of sleep leaves you susceptible to other problems like degenerative diseases, brain function and memory illnesses, and more.
You need to balance your melatonin levels.
To avoid lacking sleep and having to live with the adverse effects of sleeplessness, it would be best if you could maintain your circadian rhythm. You have to sleep regularly to keep your body healthy, and you can do so by maintaining the proper melatonin levels when it is sleep time.
But of course, you might be someone who has to work late from time to time as the best of us. So how are you going to maintain regular sleep while keeping up with your responsibilities? The good news is that there are natural ways for you to help your body rebalance your hormones and supplement your melatonin.
Here are some tips for regular good night sleep.
Exercise
When you exercise in the morning, you burn off the extra energy that you might have that keeps you awake and alert at night. Just be careful not to work out late in the afternoon, too close to your sleeping time. This is because exercise can raise your serotonin levels which may keep you excited. So it would be best to exercise regularly in the morning to help your body burn off extra energy and allow it to relearn that morning is for waking and night is for sleeping.
Reducing Blue Light Exposure at Night
If you have no night shifts, then good for you. All you will have to do is stay away from gadgets, TV, and strong lights at least an hour before you go to bed. But if you have to work at night, you can reduce your exposure by using anti-blue light glasses. And when you finish your tasks, stay away from blue light entirely an hour before sleeping.
Meditation
Stress can certainly keep your thoughts running wild even when you’re trying your best to sleep. To reduce unwanted bed thoughts, it would be best to try learning meditation to reduce stress and anxiety. Stress naturally keeps us awake because our body is hardwired to get rid of apparent problems for survival. But meditation helps you teach your body to not bother about the modern stresses that are not actually life-threatening.
Melatonin Sleeping Aids
At the end of your workday, you might find yourself having to try to sleep late at night but having a hard time because you have been recently exposed to blue light. This only means that your body hasn’t produced enough melatonin yet. The good news is that you can supplement your melatonin levels by taking Lullaby Sleep Aid Softgels. Taking melatonin sleeping aids will help you have the melatonin levels you need for sleep when your body isn’t able to produce what will suffice yet. With this, you can ensure that you sleep on the time you want so you can have a long rest that allows you to wake up refreshed the next day.
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